Field
This disclosure is generally related to distribution of digital content. More specifically, this disclosure is related to returning a CCN interest to a previous hop to facilitate processing of error-condition information associated with the interest.
Related Art
The proliferation of the Internet and e-commerce continues to create a vast amount of digital content. Content-centric network (CCN) architectures have been designed to facilitate accessing and processing such digital content. A CCN includes entities, or nodes, such as network clients, forwarders (e.g., routers), and content producers, which communicate with each other by sending “interest” packets for various content items and receiving “content object” packets in return. CCN interests and content objects are identified by their unique names, which are typically hierarchically structured variable length identifiers (HSVLI). An HVLI can include contiguous name components ordered from a most general level to a most specific level.
A CCN node that receives an interest may encounter errors in processing the interest. Such errors can include no available route to forward the interest based on the HSVLI or an administrative prohibition. A network entity, such as a forwarder, that encounters such an error is typically unable to inform the sending CCN node of the error. This creates an inefficiency in the network, as a receiving CCN node could drop the interest without informing the sending node or any other nodes in the reverse routing path of the interest.